After preparing to read by previewing and predicting, there are other strategies we can use to understand a text passage. In this section, you will learn about skimming and scanning. These strategies will help you find the main idea and details presented in a nonfiction text.
After preparing to read by previewing and predicting, there are other strategies we can use to understand a reading passage. In this section, you will learn about skimming and scanning. These strategies will help you find the main idea and details presented in a nonfiction text.
Skimming means reading a text quickly to get the main ideas. At this stage, you don't need to know every detail of the text – you just want to know what it is about. If you are taking a college course and you need to read a chapter of your textbook, it is a good idea to skim it first to see what it's about. You can (and should!) go back later to read it more carefully. This is how we skim a text:
Scanning is a useful reading strategy to use when you want to find a specific piece of information. Scanning is what we do when we look up a phone number in the Yellow Pages or when we check a supermarket flyer for one particular product. This is how we scan a text:
When we use scanning to find specific information in a nonfiction text, we use keywords. The tutorial below explains how we scan to find specific information.
Source:
Text adapted from Tania Pattison and Coast Mountain College, https://www.nscc.ca/library/docs/copyright/oer/otb197-01-college-skills-intermediate-english.pdf
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